Times like this I wish I was still living on the mainland!Thanks for letting us know, David.kind regards,

Ben

“No lists of things to be done. The day providential to itself. The hour. There is no later. This is later. All things of grace and beauty such that one holds them to one's heart have a common provenance in pain. Their birth in grief and ashes.” - Cormac McCarthy, The Road

Learn this from the waters:in mountain clefts and chasms,loud gush the streamlets,but great rivers flow silently.- Sutta Nipata 3.725

I haven't been able to find out anything about engagements in New Zealand so if anybody has information that would be appreciated.

“Peace is within oneself to be found in the same place as agitation and suffering. It is not found in a forest or on a hilltop, nor is it given by a teacher. Where you experience suffering, you can also find freedom from suffering. Trying to run away from suffering is actually to run toward it.” ― Ajahn Chah

Then the Blessed One, picking up a tiny bit of dust with the tip of his fingernail, said to the monk, "There isn't even this much form...feeling...perception...fabrications...consciousness that is constant, lasting, eternal, not subject to change, that will stay just as it is as long as eternity." (SN 22.97)

We ended up going anyway! BSV on Sundays seem to be drawing incredible crowds - they certainly need new (or more) space. Ven Punnaji didn't speak but it was an excellent morning service, with meditation in the beginning, the chanting of the Refuge, homage to the Triple Gem, Five Precepts and Metta Sutta followed by the talk by Ven Jag first reading the Uposatha Sutta and then some of his comments and reflections.

Anyone from Melbourne goes or was actually there this morning? We were the couple with an 8-year-old boy sitting on the cushions at the back (the younger ones were with the grandparents today).

Last edited by Dan74 on Sun Apr 22, 2012 11:07 am, edited 1 time in total.

“No lists of things to be done. The day providential to itself. The hour. There is no later. This is later. All things of grace and beauty such that one holds them to one's heart have a common provenance in pain. Their birth in grief and ashes.” - Cormac McCarthy, The Road

Learn this from the waters:in mountain clefts and chasms,loud gush the streamlets,but great rivers flow silently.- Sutta Nipata 3.725

“No lists of things to be done. The day providential to itself. The hour. There is no later. This is later. All things of grace and beauty such that one holds them to one's heart have a common provenance in pain. Their birth in grief and ashes.” - Cormac McCarthy, The Road

Learn this from the waters:in mountain clefts and chasms,loud gush the streamlets,but great rivers flow silently.- Sutta Nipata 3.725